... /2013/11/sex-in-the- senate-bobby-baker-99530_Page3.html> On Rometsch see <http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/ JFKrometsch.htm>. the NSA/GCHQ's global surveillance ambitions. The Home Affairs Committee asked to question the head of MI5; the Home Secretary, Teresa May, duly refused on the grounds that his appearance would 'duplicate' the existing oversight provided by the Intelligence and Security Committee. Thus the beauty of the ISC from the state's perspective: it provides the appearance of accountability and scrutiny while actually providing neither. Its members are appointed by the prime minister ( ...

... classes. (In fact, perhaps least among the upper classes, so long as they weren't expected to spy on each other.) That's partly why, when British governments have felt the need to spy on others, and on their own people, they have tried to keep the very fact of their doing so secret – SIS, MI5 and GCHQ didn't officially exist until 1989. By contrast, the CIA was set up by Congress, and has always been – formally at least – accountable to it. Britain came round to the same position eventually, but imperfectly, and only when forced to by the European Court of Human Rights. In other ways, however, ...

... , designed by Bull, manufactured by Sheffield Forgemasters, waiting at Teesport for shipment to Iraq. The supergun was never built. The apparent CIA document The apparent CIA document was taken to Asil Nadir's London solicitors in November 2010 by Olivia Frank. Ms Frank, who spied in Germany for the Israeli secret service in her youth, says that MI5 arranged for her to be jailed at the high-security Cookham Wood prison in Kent where she was to conduct negotiations with Mrs Elizabeth Forsyth, Asil Nadir's private banker. Mrs Forsyth, born into the McAlpine family, was jailed in 1996 for laundering £400,000 for Nadir but freed on appeal a year later. Nadir had ...

... Literary Spying British Writers and MI5 Surveillance 1930-1960 James Smith Cambridge University Press, 2013, £55.00, h/b John Newsinger Smith's book is an immensely valuable preliminary examination of the British secret state's surveillance of 'the left-wing writers and artists' of George Orwell's generation. As the author makes clear, the context was very different from the United States. In Britain surveillance of the arts and artists was not informed by any US-style Red Scare. In Britain, he argues, 'MI5's activity was much more circumspect and rarely resulted in direct forms of censorship', let alone any 'explosive arrests'. MI5, unlike the FBI, did ...

... CIA money and government assistance from the Scottish Business Development Fund, registering in 1982 as company number 1621896. The directors were briefed personally by CIA Chief Casey and Ed Meese, Reagan's foreign affairs advisor, and sworn to secrecy. The British cabinet set up a secret sub-committee to oversee the project, with both the Home Office (MI5) and the FCO (MI6) ordered to support the illegal exports. Michael Heseltine, Geoffrey Howe, Willie Whitelaw, Francis Pym and PM Thatcher all gave the secret project government blessing. During the 1992 Matrix Churchill trial ex-Minister Alan Clark let the cat out of the bag revealing that 'the interests of the West were best ...

... things can be copied. * In the opening paragraph the author – purportedly a CIA officer of some stripe, writing for other CIA officers – refers to the 'Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) '. Would s/he need to put MI6 in brackets for a CIA audience? * Brian Crozier is described as a 'UK Security Service (MI5) agent'. Not according to Crozier's memoir, Free Agent, he wasn't; and Crozier wasn't shy about boasting of his connections to the intelligence world. On the Web4 is a 2012 account of these pages, in an English-language Turkish paper, which says the document was then in the hands of 'an experienced intelligence expert ...

... seems 'the numbers employed in Soviet missions in the UK had by the mid-1960s reached record levels, and though a ceiling was imposed on the size of the embassy in 1968 the Russians had side-stepped it by filling the Soviet Trade Delegation with intelligence officers and by making use of "working wives". ' By 1971, MI5 estimated that of the near-1 ,000 Soviet officials (and wives) in the UK, a quarter were involved in 'undiplomatic activities'. How had this been allowed to happen? Some had few doubts:'[T ]he Prime Minister [Edward Heath] felt resentment towards his predecessor, Harold Wilson. Soviet espionage ...

... and tail' and present as normal, internally-generated copy.59 These examples of how to manipulate the media had been learned by others in the British state system and a few years later Neville Chamberlain and other supporters of the appeasement policy secretly bought and ran the weekly newspaper Truth. This was largely an operation run by the former MI5 officer and eminence grise of the time, Sir Joseph Ball. Ball used the official government information machine to push the Chamberlain line, formed the National Publicity Bureau to do the same and, in 1937, through a front man, Lord Luke of Pavenham, bought Truth, and proceeded to use it to denigrate the opponents of Chamberlain ...

... way to explore the magazine. perceived as inward-looking, in that many articles over the years dwell in depth on attacks It's not going to win prizes for presentation, but the made on Lobster (in particular, by Searchlight, which Lobster has consistently criticised as minimal use of graphics ensures that pages load quickly, working closely with MI5). However, the magazine's autobiographical asides are very and the search facility is quick and effective. Lobster absorbing, and there are plenty of other things to read if you want to steer clear of this. succeeds on the quality of its writing, and with the CD ROM The one big problem with the CD ROM is the ...

... ) — er, bit steep, you can get academic learned journal. the entire Encylopaedia Brittanica CD While Lobster is (legit version) for under £20. undoubtedly a Money no object? Then handy periodical, the idea of dozens of the main emphasis the well- is on the murkey , researched doings of articles which governments, MI5 and pack Lobster other secret services, etc. within a All very revealing and worth searchable it, just for the pub talk' click is potential. However, the real undoubtedly star turn out now is the attractive #19 Summer 2001 ...